For me, nothing in this film beats the scene in which Kathleen Turner and Michael Douglas huddle ’round a marijuana campfire in the fuselage of a crashed plane.

Taking strong belts of Jose Cuervo tequila.

Basically sitting in a giant bong 🙂

But the best part–the cutest part…is KT eating olives.

An old jar. To be sure.

But they last awhile.

And liquor kills all germs, right?

Who cares if the dead pilot took a few swigs long ago 🙂

It’s such a cozy scene.

Perhaps it’s what the Danish mean by hygge.

And it’s an ambiance I’ve only seen approached in Vertigo (Kim Novak and Jimmy Stewart by the fireplace in his apartment…after he rescues her from the waters of San Francisco Bay) and, surprisingly, The Pink Panther (David Niven and Claudia Cardinale by the fireplace…Claudia on the tiger-skin rug).

But Romancing the Stone, unlike those two films, is a full-on romcom.

Sure, there’s action…to entice the leery men 🙂

But there’s no denying that this is a romantic comedy.

And so I’m glad to join the ranks of romcom lovers.

Glad to christen a new category on my site with this fine film.

Some of it hasn’t aged so well (like Alan Silvestri’s sequenced electro-samba soundtrack), but most of it has…so kudos to director Robert Zemeckis.

Zach Norman plays a gay villain in such a way that one cannot help thinking of John Podesta.

Danny DeVito, who plays Norman’s cousin, is definitely the funniest thing in this film.

Neither Turner nor Douglas are particularly funny, but they are graceful and charming (respectively).

I would even add that Michael Douglas encapsulates a sort of masculinity which has been on the wane since the 1980s in America…UNTIL DONALD TRUMP WON THE FUCKING PRESIDENCY!

Yeah 🙂

It is trippy.

To watch this movie late at night.

To relive childhood memories.

And then to rouse oneself to one’s feet and think, “Is Donald Trump really the President? Is this not some kind of dream???” 🙂

I know for many it is a nightmare.

So I will just leave that train of thought there. For now.

Actually, there is a more serious villain in this film: Manuel Ojeda.

He is certainly a BAD HOMBRE 🙂

[sorry, can’t help it]

So yeah…

The bulk of the action takes place in Colombia.

It’s like William S. Burroughs, in search of yage, writing back to Allen Ginsberg.

Though the narrative becomes evermore-farfetched as it unfurls, it’s so much fun that we don’t much care 🙂

Buried treasure? Check.

Wrestling crocodiles? Check.

Mr. Dundee and The Goonies were from this same era 🙂

Alfonso Arau is here too…with his little “mule” 🙂

[I guess, on second thought, that is a drug-smuggling joke]

This was the performance which preceded Mr. Arau’s all-world turn as El Guapo in Three Amigos.

I would describe this wonderful film as being like a 1960s Turkish version of Sicario.

Though The Law of the Border is not a big-budget movie (a military officer comically says “let’s surround them” when he only has three soldiers [himself included]), the film is overall convincing. It conveys a very powerful story.

As stated earlier, the principal activity at issue is smuggling.

What could be more timely to this day and age?

In the US it is drugs (from Mexico), and in Turkey it is perhaps other things (coming in and out of Syria).

And if the main character looks like Putin?!?

Well, it certainly confuses the meaning, but it still makes it like a Salvador Dalí dream.

It’s like a perfect storm of symbolism.

Furthermore, besides being a film set on a border, a main issue is education in Turkey.

This is, once again, a very timely issue.

As you might have heard last year, there were many protests by high school students in Turkey about the trend of religious schools replacing secular (or science) schools.

Incidentally, our director Ömer Lütfi Akad went to the oldest high school in Turkey: Galatasaray Lisesi in Istanbul. The school was started in 1481.

But let me tell you something important…

This film is very entertaining!!!

The gunfights!

Whizz! Bing! Pow!

It reminds me a bit of Howard Hawks’ Scarface from 1932.

Also at issue in this film is the concept of change.

Can a person change their beliefs?

Like me…

Can I change my beliefs?

I am 39.

Yılmaz Güney was 29 at the time of this film.

Can we change our beliefs?

And should we?

For Güney’s character Hidir, changing his beliefs is a Herculean effort.

And the moral of the somewhat-propagandistic story is that he’s a hero…JUST FOR TRYING.

He tried to change.

He makes a valiant effort.

A bit like Samuel L. Jackson’s character Jules Winnfield in Pulp Fiction.

This is the challenge for the world.

To look ourselves in our mirrors and make an effort.

Not physically (necessarily), but philosophically.

I’m not here to offer you propaganda.

But I am very concerned with the situation the real Vladimir Putin has been put in in Syria.

Why do we fight? [to echo the old series of American propaganda films from WWII]

When we dig into history we must wade through many boring reams of paper.

If, for instance, your FOIA request is granted, you might be inundated with a fecundity of information which makes comprehension initially prohibitive.

But we dig anyway…because we are human.

Once in awhile, a decent man or woman will tell us we have the right to know the truth.

If we find their ethics convincing, we might respect them for such a statement.

And so such is the milieu surrounding the story conveyed in Francesco Rosi’s Salvatore Giuliano.

I was tired.

And so I watched and watched and watched…and things became slower.

Nothing seemed to be happening.

It was like a particularly painful silent film.

But the sound eventually makes itself indispensable.

It is the sound of strange relationships.

Like the Mafia and the CIA.

Like the Cubans and the CIA.

Like the Mafia and the Vatican.

Like the P2 Masonic lodge and Operation Gladio.

These strange relationships.

What can we prove?

Should we cower forever beneath the hulking torts of libel and slander?

What balance of justice is there between the free speech of the impoverished and defamation?

I have nothing worth taking.

There’s a reason Palsgraf sued the Long Island Railroad Co. and not the man with the newspaper-wrapped box of fireworks.

Money.

Seeking a remedy at law (as opposed to a remedy in equity).

Such a strange language.

We don’t speak this way other than in legal circumstances.

Today, when Scalia strangely bites the dust…we remember his own supposed connection to the Propaganda Due lodge.

Strange bedfellows.

Blowback.

And Salvatore Giuliano. A real personage.

It all seems so reminiscent of the “strategy of tension”…Operation Gladio…the “anni di piombo” (Years of Lead)…

And I’m sorry to say that Wikipedia seems pruned and poised to mislead on these subjects. While the contributors have made certain that Daniele Ganser is profusely maligned, I find Mr. Ganser’s research and writing on the above subjects far superior to the damage-control tone of Wikipedia.

It is the same sort of failure (this damage-control tone) which pervades the potentially groundbreaking Wikipedia page on “9/11 conspiracy theories”. Some very important (rich) people have much at stake in keeping the (false) narrative constrained to a very tight frame.

Compare, for instance, the Wikipedia articles on “9/11 conspiracy theories” (don’t even bother reading the whitewashed main article on 9/11) and “flat earth”. There is no urgency to conceal in the flat earth article. The same, sadly, cannot be said for the “9/11 conspiracy theories” travesty.

And what does all of this have to do with Salvatore Giuliano?

Well, my friends, sometimes our enemies have very colorful histories.

Consider, for instance, Osama bin Laden.

The U.S. Republican presidential candidates (particularly the deplorably daft Marco Rubio) are (while no worse than their opposing party) willfully ignorant concerning 9/11.

Rubio and company (the six remaining Republican presidential candidates) have bought hook-line-and-sinker every bit of repugnant narrative which has emanated from the U.S. federal government since day one: 9/11/01.

How closely did we work with Osama during Operation Cyclone?

Charlie Wilson’s War doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface.

And what was the nature of the relationship between the CIA and the Pakistani ISI?

The much-maligned Michael Ruppert seems to have been right on the money in describing a confluence of oil, drugs (opium), and geopolitical chess when tracing the cui bono of 9/11 to the bonanza of Afghanistan. Of course, Iraq would soon follow.

And so what of Thierry Meyssan’s claims regarding the translation of the words al-Qaeda from the Arabic to the English as “the base” or “the database”? Such a translation seems entirely plausible when considering Osama’s coursework of business administration at King Abdulaziz University in Saudi Arabia. It is, therefore, a strange mesh of false jihad (for show) and organizational acumen. It seems that the billions (before adjusting for inflation) which flowed from the CIA to the mujahideen were, at least to some significant extent, used to fund Osama’s organization in Afghanistan during the Soviet war (1979-1989).

This is usually the place at which the spin doctors attempt to interpolate the concept of blowback. The idea that we “abandoned” Osama after we were done with him. But I don’t buy that for a second. He was too valuable. He was, literally, an investment.

Michael Ruppert said in his excellent tome Crossing the Rubicon that (to paraphrase) “the CIA is Wall Street”.

Ah, but I keep leaving Salvatore Giuliano in the dust.

Mostly because I don’t want to spoil it.

This is an essential film, but it is a lot of work for the piece of meat.

I can’t say on first viewing that it is little.

To truly appreciate this film one would need a significant knowledge of Italian history in the 20th century. I barely caught the Garibaldi reference (and he died in 1882).

Strange alliances. Corruption. Italy. Sicily.

And the Communists who peacefully organized on May Day to petition the government for assistance with running water and electricity (in 1947). (!)

The century would go badly for socialists in Italy. And that was no accident. They have NATO to thank for many problems. But they also have their own security services to blame as well.

Such a fear of communism. Like today. Such a fear of Islam.

And sadly, covert operations done in the coldly-utilitarian spirit of “the ends justify the means”…

But pay particular attention to the effort needed by the police (or was it the carbinieri?) to place the body (habeas corpus) in a convincing sprawl for a chalk outline. Yeah…whoops! Once again, the “death” of bin Laden is instructive.

It takes great lengths to hold no one accountable for internal weaknesses in such massive crimes.

And so perhaps with Salvatore Giuliano, the more apt metaphor is Lee Harvey Oswald (or, closer still, Jack Ruby).

Dear friends, this film (Rome, Open City) is an extremely moving experience.

What I try to bring to you as an amateur film critic are the words of a man immersed in the film…baptized…in the experience of each film.

Most pieces of cinema are not worth this effort, but occasionally a film is worth every minute…every second…every tear shed.

Roma città aperta is a masterpiece from director Roberto Rossellini. This is a very famous film because of the milieu in which it was made.

WWII was not even over. You can imagine how hard it must have been to get film stock (film for the camera) while Europe was in flames and Italy was a defeated country occupied by the Allies.

But this film tells of Italy occupied by the Nazis (and, indeed, Rome was occupied by the Nazis prior to American occupation).

But all of these descriptions I’m giving you…they mean nothing.

What you must understand about this film is that it did something which no film before it had done.

This film was infused with the sorrow of the World Wars, but was presented as one would present a documentary.

Hence the name neorealism.

Anna Magnani is so beautiful, but not glamorous. She is beautiful because she is believable. It takes a philosophical film director to deliver such a performance. It also takes a hell of an actress!

Roma città aperta is like an opera by Mascagni or Leoncavallo. Verismo!

Act I ends with Magnani running after her fiancé. The SS have literally come to take him away. And her weaving, desperate run became an iconic film moment which wouldn’t be adequately interpolated back into the cinematic discussion till Jean-Paul Belmondo took the entire Rue Campagne-Première to die in À Bout de souffle.

Godard was young. À Bout de souffle was his first film.

Godard took the easy way. Postmodernism.

A bit from here and a bit from there. Voila!

But later Godard grew a conscience. And his conscience helped him find himself kicked to the curb of the film industry.

In our film, Aldo Fabrizi is the voice of conscience.

He plays the priest don Pietro.

He’s not your average priest.

This is a guy who stands against the Nazis.

Don Pietro helps the resistance.

Don Pietro gives and gives and gives and asks nothing.

He is a true man of God…a true humanitarian.

He helps anyone in need…atheists, communists, it doesn’t matter.

But one thing is important.

Don Pietro has made a value judgment concerning the Nazis.

He has discerned who the enemy is.

That is a large step.

Today, we are told every day who our enemy is supposed to be.

The worst offender is Fox News, but the other networks (ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC) are all equally devoid of journalistic merit.

As for the print media, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post are completely worthless.

If you lived in Nazi Germany, you would have been bombarded with propaganda about how the Jews were the enemy and how the Jews were responsible for every conceivable ill in society.

That was, of course, untrue.

In America today, we are told (particularly by the infantile Fox News) that Islam and Muslims are the enemy and that every conceivable problem in the world today relates back to this group.

This is, obviously, untrue.

The other three/five networks (ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC) are more eager to push gun control (something which Hitler would no doubt have applauded).

And so, I propose to you, dear readers that what we are seeing in the world today is an array of psychological operations which mirror something about which Italy knows only too well: Operation Gladio.

But I propose to you that what we are seeing nowadays are multiple Gladios run by gently-warring factions of the New World Order.

The biggest Gladio in operation (a series of false-flag attacks accompanied by fake wars) is the one being run by the neoconservative faction of the New World Order (including several prominent Zionists who, despite holding high U.S. government offices [and Top Secret clearances], held dual citizenship during their terms of service to the U.S. with Israel and the U.S.). This Gladio brought you the Paris attacks. This Gladio is responsible for the War “on” Terror (including the synthetic Arab army/marketing confection known as ISIS). And finally, this Gladio almost certainly brought you the San Bernardino shooting as well.

The main goal of the neoconservative Gladio is endless war. It is a macro operation. It operates on the level of geopolitics. War profiteering, oil, drugs… The neoconservative Gladio brought you the mother of all false-flags: 9/11.

On the other hand is the liberal Gladio. The liberal Gladio brought you Sandy Hook (their masterpiece). Their other suspected jobs are Aurora (the Batman shooter) and Umpqua. It wouldn’t be a stretch to also include the OKC bombing and the Waco massacre of the Branch Davidians. But focusing on the first three cases alone (Sandy Hook, Aurora, Umpqua), it is very clear that the liberal Gladio has as its main goal gun control.

The liberal Gladio is operating on a micro (or domestic) level. The San Bernardino shooting was meant to make Obama look soft on crime. The neocon gang which engineered the shooting exhibited perfect timing as Obama had recently announced an initiative to reclaim MRAPs from local law enforcement across the country (in response to police abuse of power). The neocons took a page out of the liberal false-flags-for-gun-control playbook on this one, but the main goal was endless war. [This, of course, didn’t prevent Obama from trying to leverage the event to prop up HIS faction’s agenda.]

The unfortunate equation is that neither side can expose the deeds of the opposing side because they are both dealing in untruths. Obama has, up until now, squandered his opportunity to bring the neocons of the Bush administration to task for 9/11 and the fraudulent War “on” Terror. Indeed, Obama has only proven that he himself is a fraud down to his very core.

The layers-upon-layers of lies in the United States cannot hold. Snowden pierced the veil. Only those with a conscience can save us now.

This, then, is a film review. All articles on this site take advantage of this form in one way or another.

Adherence is a matter of self-calibration.

I have found the form for me. Which is to say, it depends on the film.

And so what is Cine-tracts?

Try the purge function. Check the deletion log.

Not a very straightforward answer.

Well, these were some short, silent films made by various directors in response to the events of May 1968 in Paris.

The reason I didn’t review this “film” earlier is that I forgot to check the ether for free content.

It’s a bit dodgy. You never quite know what you’re getting.

On any account, I found about 75 minutes of these cine-tracts and watched the whole, soundless lot.

Jean-Luc Godard’s touch was apparent. Whether or not Jean-Pierre Gorin was involved at this early stage, I am too lazy to check. Chris Marker is said to have participated. That certainly seems plausible given that the mode of creation involves still photos rather than moving pictures.

Ah, but the pictures do move. Or rather, the camera’s motion creates an illusion that the still pictures are moving. Indeed, their relationship to the camera is changing. Distance. Perspective. Renaissance. Light. Shadow.

These cine-tracts play like what they likely were: short, encouraging films for the students and workers who were rebelling against the times.

There are some ingenious directorial devices here and there, but generally the message (both literal and symbolic) takes precedence over imagination and invention. To be sure, the filmmakers involved were politically engaged and apparently zealous in their dedication.

And so now it is hard to recall that Spring of ’68. I was not there. I have tried to put myself there. Because many important currents converge in Paris 1968.

Is it inappropriate to called Cine-tracts a Godard film? Perhaps. But the opposite end of the spectrum would deprive us of this diary-like glimpse into the auteur’s mind. You want to understand Adieu au langage? Start here. Or continue here. Even end here.

There is no shame in being poor. Scarcity has made it difficult. A small concern. Not definitively growing.

The key to understanding Cine-tracts is to be found in everyday life. Poor, sad routine. Run-down dross of capitalism. The ass of capitalism looks strikingly like the ass of communism.

Donkey. Camel. BMW.

Yes, the world markets are sensitive to bullshit. And each magnified ramification comes home to the poor Joe. Average Joe. And Jane.

Joe and John Doe and Jane Smith can’t seem to escape the high school algebra problem in which they are frozen like insects.

Joe Schmoe. A very prestigious family.

And therein lies the problem. A bunch of nobodies. All they can offer is a peach. Or a glass of water. Or a near-worthless coin.

There’s no movement to join. Will you start a movement? In real politics (not the pap which passes for such in the houses of congresses) the only victory is death. Man does not want to hear an uncomfortable message. Your type has already, long ago, been profiled. You don’t fit in this world. There is no future for you. As even Orwell seemed to intimate in 1984, a Winston Smith who lives must compromise.

And so what happened to Godard? What happened to the fire of May 1968–that zeal which seemed inextinguishable? What happened to the hippies? What happened to the revolutionary socialists of the ’60s? Did they merely switch drugs?

To conflate the participants of May 1968 in Paris with American hippies is problematic. Are there similarities and commonalities? Sure! But the cultural backgrounds of the two groups were quite different. This difference persists. France and the U.S.A. are further than opposite sides of a common coin.

From the standpoint of language, I am probably more qualified to comment on American hippies (though I am much too young to have first-hand knowledge). A gross simplification would seem to indicate that the idealism of the American counter-culture gave way to a nihilism (and finally to assimilation and general diametric abandonment of youthful principles).

But history is always open. That spark…that archetype of socialism…that magical motif can be applied to any political movement…in that history may be all but written, yet it is never more than a pathetic extension of the actuarial tables. The only insurance of life is to live while alive.

It may sound like heresy to say it, but this is the third great James Bond movie up to this point in the series. Furthermore, it is particularly rich that it came out during the presidency of George H.W. Bush. The pleasant surprise is that Carey Lowell takes the cake as hottest Bond girl through the first 16 films. These are controversial claims and allusions. Buckle up.

1974. The first great Bond film. There is no denying the palpable rush of Dr. No–no topping the exotic sensuality of From Russia with Love. It has less to do with Connery, perhaps the best Bond, than it does with cinema. The first great James Bond film came under the watchful eye of auteur Guy Hamilton. He lives. The Man with the Golden Gun. Yes, it was a Roger Moore film. So sue me.

1985. The second great James Bond film. Travesty of travesties! He’s going to name two from the 80s. Yes, that’s right. A View to a Kill. John Glen made an auteurist bid with this flick. Again with the Roger Moore. John Glen lives.

1989. The third perfect Bond film. John Glen achieves immortality. Hyperbole. Hyperbole. This is to take nothing away from our cherished Guy Hamilton. He too made more that just Golden Gun.

But let us stretch out a bit… What makes these three films so strong? Answer: the villains. Christopher Lee. Christopher Walken. And Christopher…er, Robert Davi.

George H.W. Bush. There was a book from 1992 called The Mafia, CIA and George Bush written by Pete Brewton. That’s back when there was only one George Bush known on the world stage. Middle initials were unnecessary. I haven’t read the book in question, but it bears mentioning that I remembered the pithy title mistakenly…as The CIA, Drugs, and George Bush. There’s more than an Oxford comma’s difference between the two…obviously.

1998 brought the world a book called Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion by Gary Webb. I have not read this book either.

So what, you may be asking, is my fucking point?

Let me note a few poignant books I have read. 9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA by Webster Griffin Tarpley. Crossing the Rubicon by Michael Ruppert. The Big Wedding by Sander Hicks. 9/11 The Big Lie (L’Effroyable imposture) by Thierry Meyssan. Pentagate also by Meyssan. The Shadow Government: 9/11 and State Terror by Len Bracken. The Arch Conspirator also by Bracken. Body of Secrets by James Bamford. America’s “War on Terrorism” by Michel Chossudovsky. The 9/11 Commission Report: Omissions and Distortions by David Ray Griffin. The Bilderberg Group by Daniel Estulin. Inside Job: Unmasking the 9/11 Conspiracies by Jim Marrs. The Terror Conspiracy also by Marrs.

If you’re still reading you are likely laughing or transfixed. And again I can sense the question: what is the fucking point?

Well, dear reader, it is that I can wholeheartedly agree with Mark Gorton’s reservations regarding George H.W. Bush. I used to think Dick Cheney was the scariest guy in the world (thanks Mike Ruppert). Donald Rumsfeld always seemed in the running. But after reading Gorton’s fastidious research, I concur that the prize should probably go to Poppy Bush.

At wikispooks.com, one can find the following articles by Gorton:

Fifty Years of the Deep State

The Coup of ’63, Part I

and

The Political Dominance of the Cabal

Gorton is not your average conspiracy theorist. His degrees are from Yale, Stanford, and Harvard (respectively). His business successes include founding LimeWire and the Tower Research Capital hedge fund.

And that brings us to sex.

Carey Lowell. With her androgynous hairstyle, she still (because of?) manages to be the hottest Bond girl through the first 16 films. Sure, Timothy Dalton is great, but Carey Lowell is fan-fucking-tastic. The message of the establishment is that if you don’t play by the rules, you don’t get the sex cookie. Carey Lowell is not an establishment actress in this movie. Her character is the anti-Bond girl in some respects. For this series, anyway, that’s as good as it gets. Until Anamaria Marinca is cast alongside (or as) 007, the bar is memorably set by Lowell. Perhaps as I critically watch the more recent films I will find other Bond girls who truly stand out in a believable way, but Lowell takes the cake through the first 16 films.

Lowell lived in Houston for awhile. Back to Bush. Right down the road is the scariest man in the world? Dear readers…the Internet remains free for only so long. Soon we may have to get all Bradbury and become book people. If Carey ever gets tired of Richard Gere, maybe she’ll meet us in the forest. I’ll be Histoire(s) du cinema. The book.